1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a management apparatus.
2. Description of the Related Art
There is a management apparatus which manages browse and utilization of an access-restricted (hereafter secret) file (for example, see Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open Nos. 2001-167016 and 2002-244927). FIG. 9 is a diagram explaining an outline of a conventional management apparatus. As shown by an arrow (1) in FIG. 9, a conventional management apparatus accepts a request to register a secret file received from a predetermined user (for example, user X), and the management apparatus stores dependence relationship information and authorized user information in a storage unit and associates the dependence relationship information and authorized user information to the file information. The secret file includes the file information used to identify the secret file, the dependence relationship information indicating a dependence relationship between the secret file and other secret files, and the authorized user information used to identify an authorized user who should be permitted to browse the secret file.
As shown by an arrow (2) in FIG. 9, when accepting a request to browse the secret file from a predetermined user (for example, user Y), the conventional management apparatus refers to authorized user information associated with the file information on the browse request file, and determines whether or not the source user of the browse request is registered as an authorized user of the browse request file.
Then, when the source user is registered as the authorized user, the conventional management apparatus refers to the dependence relationship information associated with the file information on the browse request file, and specifies a dependent file having the dependence relationship with the browse request file.
Then the conventional management apparatus refers to the authorized user information associated with the file information on the specified dependent file, and determines whether or not the source user of the browse request is registered as the authorized user of the dependent file.
When the source user of the browse request is registered as the authorized user of the dependent file, as shown by an arrow (3) in FIG. 9, the conventional management apparatus transmits information (for example, encryption key used to decrypt the encrypted secret text) necessary to browse the browse request file which is a browse permission response to the source user.